


eye of the beholder

by pearlfriends



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Drawing, F/F, Nude Modeling, Painting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-30
Updated: 2017-07-30
Packaged: 2018-12-08 18:08:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,461
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11651907
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pearlfriends/pseuds/pearlfriends
Summary: The first time Blue Pearl draws it's because she has to. It turns out she has a talent.





	eye of the beholder

**Author's Note:**

> Apologies if this has been done before! i don't frequent this tag even though it's one of my favourite ships.
> 
> Please enjoy!

The first time she draws it's because she has to. There was a court case that needed a court artist, she was assigned, and Blue Pearl found herself drawing away. Long fingers on a smooth panel, she zoned out as she so oft did and the sound of the recollections that she was meant to depict merged into the background. As a result, her work came out prettier than it was accurate, but her Diamond didn't seem to mind.

 

She walked away by Blue Diamond's side with a blooming talent and the verdict weighing in her mind, birthing opposition that she wasn't allowed to express.

 

When she stands silently, her sensitive ears pick up on the hushed pads of another pearl's footsteps. She tilts her head, saying nothing. She doesn't need her sight to know who it is.

 

"Good job earlier," the voice says. Despite its compliment, it still sounds taunting.

 

"Oh," Blue Pearl whispers. "Thank you."

 

"I got stuck _writing!"_ Yellow Pearl squawks, complaining in the way they only could: with one another, in secret. "I mean, _couldn't_ they have _gotten_ a _recording device?!"_

 

"It's good," Blue Pearl says back gently. She swallows, mouth dry from speaking. "To h-have a writer. Art can be misinterpreted..."

 

"And a transcript can't?" Yellow Pearl asks back, smirking.

 

Blue Pearl says nothing.

 

* * *

 

The second time she draws it's an accident. Her mind drifted just like the spaceship she was in, weaving through every rock and aiming for a planet that still remained ways away. Blue Diamond's voice, soft yet menacing, is what brings her back.

 

"What are you doing?"

 

She gasps, turning her head swiftly enough for her hair to lift and her eyes to catch a glimmer of Yellow Pearl staring at her with concern. Quickly, she salutes and bows her head in apology. "...I wasn't thinking, my Diamond. I'll--"

 

"...Keep going," Blue Diamond encourages her after scrutinising the art panel. On it was a depiction of vast space itself, dozens of star-specks planted by Pearl's patient, focused finger.

 

It takes a moment, but Blue Pearl gets back to it, skinny digits sliding along the touchscreen canvas.

 

Yellow Diamond barely hears the conversation, but her own smug pearl smiles to herself.

 

* * *

 

The twentieth time she draws it's a challenge.

 

"You should draw something _pretty_ ," Yellow Pearl teases, poking her nose in.

 

"Oh," Blue Pearl says. She thought her subject matters were pretty, but maybe she could do better. "Like what?"

 

"Like--" Yellow Pearl responds, balancing herself en pointe on one foot and stretching forward, her other leg behind her -- _"me?"_ She then stands upright on both sets of toes, her eyes closed and hands to her chest with an obnoxiously conceited grin. " _I'll_ even take my _uniform_ off!"

 

Blue Pearl grimaces, her face flushing. The hot, unfamiliar sensation is almost unbearable on her cool skin, but she's growing used to it. Lately Yellow Pearl makes her blush more than usual. "I'll do it," she says, gentle and soulful as always.

 

"Ah--what?" Yellow Pearl asks, opening an eye.

 

"I'll do it," Blue Pearl repeats. "I'll draw you."

 

Yellow Pearl's face drops, and she stares right at her, knowing she's making eye contact despite that shaggy fringe.

 

They're silent for a long while, a silence that's only awkward to one of them, before Yellow Pearl rearranges herself into a flashy pose and Blue Pearl arranges herself with a fresh canvas panel. She gets to work, fingers painting every detail, exactly like her own but so different in attitude. While Blue Pearl paints the soft yet sharp curvature of her friend's form, it occurs to her just how pretty she is, how much she wishes she could touch it. Immortalising her is oddly intimate.

 

The impressed gawk that she gets when Yellow Pearl observes what she's created is unbelievably satisfying. The quiet "...Can I keep it?" as Blue Pearl nods 'yes' and lets Yellow Pearl run off with her gift is even better.

 

She's won.

 

* * *

 

The more that Yellow Pearl enjoys her 'gifts' the more it occurs to Blue Pearl that her art conveys meaning, that it makes others feel, that it has thoughts of its own. Not all of those thoughts are okay for a pearl to have, though, so she gets stumped.

One time when her mind wanders off and guides her hand, she draws a pearl in chains. She only makes it halfway through before she realises what she's done and panics, scrapping the piece immediately. Her head turns all around her in horror, and her tiny chest deflates in relief when she sees that nobody's around.

 

* * *

 

When Blue Pearl draws the rebel pearl, with her foreign yet satisfying ideals and her proud sword held high, she can't bring herself to destroy it. Another check around her and she keeps it, the panel disappearing into the gemstone on her chest.

That art belonged to her. Those conveyed thoughts and feelings were hers. She would hide them for as long as she needed to as long as it meant she had something of her own.

 

* * *

 

When Blue Pearl leaves Earth for the last time, the pang of sadness that she feels over its approaching death drives her fingers to draw. When she's given her break, she stands in front of another canvas and paints away, capturing that flawlessly blue sky and every blade of "grass". In all her years, they've never decimated a planet so oddly iconic...so oddly beautiful. Or have they?

When she reaches the piece's end, several tears start rolling down her cheeks as though the planet has blown up at that exact moment. She quickly wipes them away, but still relishes the confusing feelings rather than stopping them.

She keeps that one too. Despite its impending doom, she would forever keep Earth on a panel in her heart.

 

* * *

 

When Blue Pearl gifts a portrait of Pink Diamond to Blue Diamond, she doesn't know if she's done right or wrong. She can only stand, hands folded neatly in front of her, staring up at her sobbing master and waiting to be praised or punished. She figured it would be a good way to show her condolences, to express her own grief the only way she knew how.

At last, there's a point when the sobbing stops and words come through. "It's...beautiful," Blue Diamond says, face aching with the light smile she delivers. "You captured her... _perfectly_."

She's done right.

 

* * *

 

Eventually the clothes come off. After the first few times, the awkwardness dissipated. Seeing Yellow Pearl flustered and self conscious was adorable, but her identical body had nothing that Blue Pearl hadn't seen already on her own form.

Painting Yellow Pearl nude is a whole new way to appreciate her. As always, Blue Pearl captures the details flawlessly, but this time with every shadow and tendon and muscle tone fully exposed and noticed. She traces Yellow Pearl's jutting hipbones, her obnoxious nose, the shark fins she called 'shoulderblades', her toned calves and her flat belly.

Strangely enough, the more she spills onto the canvas, the more her heart does, too. Yellow Pearl has never heard her speak so much, has never heard her voice her thoughts and feelings this way. The simple requests to turn her head a bit more feel like a rebellion all in themselves. And, oh, goodness -- that one time she _laughed_ Yellow Pearl blushed so hard and so long that Blue Pearl actually drew it in, unknowing that it was from affection.

Blue Pearl asks if she can keep one of them. There's a bit of hesitation, but when Yellow Pearl grants her the 'yes', the canvas disappears into her gemstone and nestles next to her heart along with her other loved, treasured meanings.

 

* * *

 

"You should draw something _pretty_ ," Yellow Pearl says again, grinning smugly. This time, however, the mockery is false. Her voice is slightly elevated as though something's coming.

 

Blue Pearl grits her teeth and stays silent, focused on drawing the Earth flower in front of her.

 

"Like... _yourself! **Ahaha!"**_

 

Yellow Pearl scampers off, leaving her sweaty and flustered and clueless.

 

* * *

 

 

The _nth_ time she draws it's because she wants to. The command she's been given is merely telling her what was already planned.

The infamous Rose Quartz is on trial at last. The form she's chosen for herself is nowhere near as mighty as her reputation -- a chubby human-thing, pink top with a yellow star, but the gemstone in her navel doesn't lie. Blue Pearl's fingers itch as the canvas loads up before her.

Yellow Pearl shoots her a knowing, eager look. Her determined, fiery smile earns a soft one back -- and together, they begin, one tapping and the other drawing, composing a pretty symphony of clicks and slides that was all theirs.


End file.
